When I read "... Somewhere in all of these companies exists the belligerent ** ...", I couldn't help but think of the Bill Burr bit on "chain restaurants":
(cut out some of background to focus on where he gets to similar patter)
In any case, fully agree. There are always these environmental pressures and "agents" (to evoke / use a sort of game theory modeling context) that lead to this sort of nonsense. Depending on the incentives, scope of power of people making decisions, training (esp., MBAs - simply being trained to look at "numbers in spreadsheets", essentially), etc., it's all too easy, these days, to end up with this kind of B$.
https://youtu.be/QWCINJ8uvIc?t=1m8s
(cut out some of background to focus on where he gets to similar patter)
In any case, fully agree. There are always these environmental pressures and "agents" (to evoke / use a sort of game theory modeling context) that lead to this sort of nonsense. Depending on the incentives, scope of power of people making decisions, training (esp., MBAs - simply being trained to look at "numbers in spreadsheets", essentially), etc., it's all too easy, these days, to end up with this kind of B$.